The first group of anti-tank dogs arrived at the frontline at the end of the
summer of 1941 and included 30 dogs and 40 trainers. Their deployment
revealed some serious problems. In order to save fuel and ammunition, dogs
had been trained on tanks which stood still and did not fire their guns. In
the field, the dogs refused to dive under moving tanks. Some persistent dogs
ran near the tanks, waiting for them to stop but were shot in the process.
Gunfire from the tanks scared away many of the dogs. They would run back to
the trenches and often detonated the charge upon jumping in, killing Soviet
soldiers. To prevent that, the returning dogs had to be shot, often by their
controllers and this made the trainers unwilling to work with new dogs.
Some went so far as to say that the army did not stop with sacrificing
people to the war and went on to slaughter dogs too; those who openly
criticized the program were persecuted by "special departments" (military
counterintelligence).[3] Out of the first group of 30 dogs, only four
managed to detonate their bombs near the German tanks, inflicting an unknown
amount of damage. Six exploded upon returning to the Soviet trenches,
killing and injuring soldiers.[3] Three dogs were shot by German troops and
taken away, despite furious attempts by the Soviets to prevent this, which
provided examples of the detonation mechanism to the Germans. A captured
German officer later reported that they learned of the anti-tank dog design
from the killed animals, and considered the program desperate and
inefficient. A German propaganda campaign sought to discredit the Red Army,
saying that Soviet soldiers refuse to fight and send dogs instead.[3]
Another serious training mistake was revealed later; the Soviets used their
own diesel engine tanks to train the dogs rather than German tanks which had
gasoline engines.[5] As the dogs relied on their acute sense of smell, the
dogs sought out familiar Soviet tanks instead of strange-smelling German
tanks.[7] This effectively meant that the Soviets had trained the dogs to
sabotage their own army.